parenting neurodiverse kids - it’s hard, here’s why
Shame alert: it can be hard to *like* our neurodiverse children. That feels so shitty.
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And: it's not actually them. They're not actually unlikable. They're not a problem.
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And: it's not actually you. You're not actually a selfish, poorly regulated, failing parent. You're not a problem.
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Everything that is triggering about them (pretty much everything) is about something that happened to you as a little one (a little one).
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A lot of it was systemic, generational, even epigenetic. It was coded into you in the past, when you were small, confused, defenseless.
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When you don't like your kid, it's not actually *you.* It's an automatic, unconscious, *past* part of you.
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The part that learned that hitting meant you were a bad person. That learned loud noises were dangerous.
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Hitting isn't great, but come on, kids hit. And then we continue to model repair and move on. Loud shouting/talking are profoundly triggering, but also just, really, a harmless noise.
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Huge moods swings can terrify us as parents, but emotions are simply biology, and it's actually safer to have them then to suppress them. We think they'll never end. We think they mean something's really wrong.
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Endless, big energy feels dangerous in inside spaces, or spaces where lots of cars move fast, but actually, it's just big energy. We love it in animals. We love to watch a cheetah run.
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Yes, you and your kid might be different, but it doesn't have to register to your system as a scary problem, the way it is now. You could co-exist in peace, each being exactly who you are. Difference is not a threat.
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It's neither you nor them. To keep using the computer analogy, there's a virus in your system. And it's not your fault. You didn't put it there, and you had no way of rejecting it. Just knowing that is the unshaming.
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And - you might be able to update the system. If a neurological process called memory reconsolidation occurs, you can deactivate, de-trigger, make the shifts that end the generational pattern. You can genuinely see your kiddo in a new way. Without forcing or faking it.
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Neurologically, it can happen in a really deep true way. Where even if you go searching for that old triggered feeling, you will no longer be able to activate it, no matter how hard you try.
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This type of memory reconsolidation doesn't happen all the time. If it did, we might make oopsie updates to really important things like our knowing of gravity, or of traffic rules. (Knowings that live in implicit memory.)
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But until mid-2000s we didn't think implicit learning COULD update - just be counteracted or kind of (not really) "extincted."
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And now we know that it can update, be *totally overwritten,* given a very particular set of circumstances.
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I'm formally trained and certified in helping those particular circumstances to come about.
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I'm trained in optimizing your journey with me to update the implicit learnings that aren't helpful. The ones that result in you having a hard time liking your kids and other parenting hardship.
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You get so much energy and peace back. SO MUCH. You don't even realize how much energy/peace is going into you holding your system in a particular kind of way. Suppressing/forcing/etc. Until you get it back.
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Schedule a call if you're into it.
